Realism and the Absolute Conception

P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 1 Realism and the Absolute Conception A. W. MOORE 1. REALISM, SCIENCE, AND ETHICS It is often said that Bernard Williams opposes ethical realism. And so he does. 1 But what does this mean? The term “realism” has a notorious and bewildering variety of uses. What does Williams oppose? The first and most basic thing that needs to be emphasized is that what he opposes is just what its name implies: realism about ethics. This highlights something that is becoming increasingly standard in philosophical uses of the term “realism,” namely, its relativization to a subject matter. Granted such relativization, a realist about history may or may not be a realist about mathematics, say. Indeed, we shall see in due course that Williams’ opposition to realism about ethics is to be understood precisely in contrast with his acceptance of realism about science. But here already there is a complication. For the term “realism” is also sometimes used without relativization. We sometimes hear it said of a given philosopher that he or she is a realist tout court. More to the point, we sometimes hear it said of Williams. Moreover, I think this is an appropriate thing to say of him, properly understood. I also think it is an appropriate point of leverage in the attempt to understand his position. Williams’ realism – tout court – receives famous and memorable expres- sion in his book on Descartes, where he writes, “Knowledge is of what is there anyway.” 2 This is his summary way of putting what he describes in the previous sentence as “a very basic thought,” namely that if knowledge is what it claims to be, then it is knowledge of a reality which exists independently of that knowledge, and indeed (except in the special case where the reality known happens itself to be some psychological item) independently of any thought or experience. 3 1 For an early indication of this opposition, see Williams (1973). For later dissatisfaction with the early way of putting it, see Williams (1996), p. 19. 2 Williams (1978), p. 64, his emphasis. 3 Ibid. 24 P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 Realism and the Absolute Conception 25 This is a basic realism which is not itself tied to any particular subject matter. 4 Grafted on to this unqualified realism is the distinction that most con- cerns Williams, a distinction between different ways of explaining how we come by the knowledge we have. It is this that underlies the contrast he wants to draw between science and ethics. The idea is not that we do not have ethical knowledge. 5 Nor is the idea that the ethical knowledge we do have is not “what it claims to be” and so lies outside the ambit of his unqual- ified realism. 6 The idea is rather that the best reflective explanation of our having the ethical knowledge we have, unlike the best reflective explanation of our having the scientific knowledge we have, cannot directly vindicate that knowledge: it cannot directly reveal us as having got anything right. 7 The position that motivates this idea is roughly as follows. We (human beings) not only inhabit a reality that is there anyway. We also inhabit dif- ferent social worlds that we have created for ourselves. Part of what it is to inhabit a particular social world is to operate with a particular set of what Williams calls “thick” ethical concepts. By a “thick” ethical concept Williams means a concept whose applicability is both “action-guiding” and “world-guided.” Examples are the concepts of infidelity, blasphemy, and racism.Toapply a thick ethical concept in a given situation, for example to accuse someone of infidelity, is, in part, to evaluate the situation, which char- acteristically means providing reasons for doing certain things; but it is also to make a judgment that is subject to correction if the situation turns out not to be a certain way, for example, if it turns out that the person who has been 4 Of course, it immediately suggests at least one thing that could reasonably be meant by realism about any given subject matter, namely, the view that that subject matter admits of knowledge. But in itself, Williams’ realism is neutral with respect to any such view. This may make it seem rather anodyne. However, it is by no means so anodyne that no philosopher has seen fit to reject it. Many notable philosophers have marshalled many notable arguments against any such realism, in some cases with a view simply to denying it, in other cases with a view, more radically, to repudiating the very concepts in whose terms it is couched. I shall present an example of the latter in §4. (For further examples, and for further discussion, see Moore [1997a], ch. 5, §8 and ch. 6.) For my own part, I think Williams’ realism is no more than the intuitive deliverance of reflective common sense. I shall have more to say about this too. 5 See n. 4: the denial that we have ethical knowledge is certainly one thing that could be intended by the rejection of ethical realism, particularly when it takes the form of a denial that talk of ethical knowledge so much as makes sense. But that is not what Williams intends. 6 Or at least – as I have tried to argue in Moore (2003), pp. 347–348 – the idea had better not be that. That had better not be part of what he is getting at in his repeated insistence that ‘ethical thought has no chance of being everything it seems’ (e.g. Williams [1985], pp. 135 and 199). If that were part of what he is getting at, then other doctrines of his, including doctrines that we shall be examining later, would be severely compromised. 7 See esp. Williams (1985), ch. 8. See also Williams (1995a), and Williams (1995b), pp. 205– 210. P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 26 A. W. Moore accused of infidelity did not in fact go back on any relevant agreement. In favourable circumstances, a judgment involving a thick ethical concept can be immune to any such correction and can count as an item of ethical knowl- edge. 8 Now the social worlds that we inhabit admit of incompatible rivals in which quite different thick ethical concepts are exercised. Although we need to inhabit some social world, there is no one social world that we need to inhabit. A good reflective explanation for someone’s having a given item of ethical knowledge must therefore include an account of their inhabiting a social world that allows them to have it. This explanation may draw ele- ments from history, psychology, and/or anthropology. But it cannot itself make use of any of the thick ethical concepts exercised in the knowledge, because it must be from a vantage point of reflection outside their social world. This means that it cannot directly vindicate the knowledge. This contrasts with the case of scientific knowledge. A good reflective explana- tion for someone’s having a given item of scientific knowledge can make use of the very concepts exercised in the knowledge, and so can straightfor- wardly and directly vindicate the knowledge, by revealing that the person has come by the knowledge as a result of being suitably sensitive to how things are. Thus Williams’ realism about science, but not about ethics. Here is another way to characterize the position. Inhabiting a social world means having a certain point of view. Ethical knowledge is knowledge from such a point of view. What prevents a good reflective explanation of someone’s having such knowledge from directly vindicating it is the fact that the explanation must include an account of how they have the relevant point of view (where this does not itself consist in their knowing anything). By contrast, there can be scientific knowledge that is not from any point of view. A good reflective explanation of someone’s having such scientific knowledge need not involve the same kind of indirection. This position invites countless questions, of course. For instance, what are the criteria for a “good” reflective explanation? Or for a “direct” vindi- cation of an item of knowledge? But one question that has troubled critics as much as any concerns the science side of Williams’ ethics/science contrast. What reason is there for thinking that there can be scientific knowledge that is not from any point of view? Williams’ own reason for thinking this, familiarly, is grounded in the unqualified realism that forms the basis of his position. 9 Taking that realism as a premise, he argues for the possibility of what he calls “the absolute 8 Williams (1985), pp. 140–148. 9 We shall see later (§3) that “basis” is a somewhat inappropriate metaphor here. For now, we can let it pass. P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 Realism and the Absolute Conception 27 conception,” or “the absolute conception of reality,” where what this is is, precisely, a conception of reality that both constitutes scientific knowledge and is not from any point of view. 10 I have tried to defend Williams’ argument elsewhere. 11 In this essay, I am more interested in understanding Williams’ position than in motivating it. In particular, I want to see what the conclusion of his argument can teach us about its premise, the underlying realism. 2. THE ABSOLUTE CONCEPTION If the conclusion of Williams’ argument is to teach us anything, we need to be clear about what that conclusion is. When I defended Williams’ argu- ment, I prefaced my defence with, in effect, a list of twenty-two things that it is not. 12 My list was meant as a safeguard against various possible miscon- struals of Williams’ position, many of which I take to be actual. I shall not rehearse that list in full now. But I do want to draw attention to one item on the list that is especially pertinent to this discussion. Williams’ conclusion is not that there are some uniquely privileged God-given concepts waiting to be discovered – as it were, the “one true eternal” stock of concepts that equip us to represent things from no point of view. 13 Talk of “the” absolute conception encourages this idea. But there is nothing in Williams to preclude the thought that, if we are to represent things from no point of view, then we shall be involved in continual decisions between various incompatible but equally legitimate conceptualizations; that these decisions may be highly parochial, in that they may be tailored to certain context-specific needs and interests of ours; that they may be hard- earned, in that they may involve us in intensive conceptual and empirical 10 See esp. Williams (1978), pp. 64–65. For further discussion see ibid., pp. 65–68, 211– 212, 239, 245–249, and 300–303; Williams (1985), pp. 138–140; Blackburn (1994); Dancy (1993), ch.9, §2; Heal (1989), §7.2; Hookway(1995); Jardine(1980); Jardine(1995); Putnam (1992), ch. 5; and Strawson (1989), Appendix B. 11 Moore (1997a), Ch. 4, §3. I may, however, attach less substance than Williams does to the relation between a conception of reality that is not from any point of view and science. I take it to be more or less a defining characteristic of science that, if a conception of reality that is not from any point of view can be couched at all, then it can be couched in scientific terms: see ibid., pp. 75–76. 12 Ibid., ch. 4, §1. I say “in effect” because I was arguing for a conclusion that is a slight variation on Williams’ conclusion; but I think the differences are inessential. (I was not concerned with completeness. Contrast Williams’ definition of the absolute conception in Williams [1978], p. 65 with what I say in my ibid., p. 64.) 13 See Moore (1997a), p. 64. Cf. also ibid., pp. 95–96. (There is a hint that this is Williams’ conclusion in Korsgaard [1996], p. 68. But it is only a hint. What Korsgaard goes on to say seems to me to show great exegetical sensitivity.) P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 28 A. W. Moore endeavour; and that it may take long-term active participation and com- mitment on our part both to sustain these decisions vis-`a-vis their rivals and to implement them in the joint process of representing how things are and justifying our representations. McDowell, writing about the absolute conception, caricatures it as involving a picture of “science as a mode of inquiry in which the facts can directly imprint themselves on our minds, without need of mediation by anything as historically conditioned and open to dispute as canons of good and bad scientific argument.” 14 That is sim- ply unfair. (It is unfair even apart from the point I am making about rival conceptualizations. Williams nowhere denies the need for mediation of the sort McDowell describes in discovering what the facts are, that is in apply- ing whatever conceptual apparatus is in play. It is not clear, in fact, that even if Williams had been committed to there being uniquely privileged God-given concepts, he would have had to deny the need for mediation of the sort McDowell describes in discovering what they are.) Even more unfair, it seems to me, is the related but further idea, all but embraced by McDowell, that the possibility of the absolute conception entails what Davidson calls “a dualism of scheme and content” 15 –adual- ism that Davidson, McDowell, and others have done so much to discredit. 16 Scheme, according to this dualism, is constituted by concepts; content is that extraconceptual element in reality which we seek to capture, by an impo- sition of our concepts on it, whenever we represent things to be a certain way. Content is something that we passively receive. Concepts, by contrast, are things that we actively exercise. 17 The reason why the possibility of the absolute conception is thought to entail this dualism is, precisely, that it is thought to require uniquely privileged God-given concepts, where part of what uniquely privileges these concepts is in turn thought to be that they constitute a scheme which is, in McDowell’s words, “peculiarly transpar- ent, so that content comes through undistorted.” 18 But we need not accept that the possibility of the absolute conception requires uniquely privileged God-given concepts. And even if we did accept this, we need not accept that what uniquely privileges the concepts has to be characterized in terms of scheme and content – still less, in terms of “transparent” scheme and “undistorted” content. 19 14 McDowell (1986), p. 380. 15 Davidson (1984). See esp. pp. 187 and 189. 16 See, e.g., ibid., passim; McDowell (1994), passim; and Rorty (1980), esp. ch. VI, §5. See also Rorty (1991b), pp. 138–139. 17 See again McDowell (1994), passim. See also Child (1994). 18 McDowell (1986), p. 381. 19 Cf. Williams (1995b), p. 209. P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 Realism and the Absolute Conception 29 I see no reason, then, to think that Williams’ conclusion entails any scheme/content dualism. A different worry, which is worth pausing to address, is that his premise entails such a dualism. Does not the idea that knowledge is of a reality that exists independently of that knowledge entail that it is of something extraconceptual, something on which we impose our concepts whenever we know anything to be the case? No. Williams’ premise is that knowledge is of a reality that exists inde- pendently of being known, not independently of being knowable. 20 It does nothing to foreclose the possibility that what is known is essentially con- ceptual. In fact, it is really nothing but a kind of schematic summary of such commonplaces as this: even if no-one had known that e = mc 2 ,itwould still have been the case that e = mc 2 . 21 This commonplace certainly allows for the fact that e = mc 2 to be, in McDowell’s words again, “essentially capable of being embraced in thought in exercises of spontaneity [that is, in exer- cises of conceptual capacities].” 22 (Indeed – although this is not really to the point as far as Williams’ premise is concerned – it allows for this without in any way prejudicing the thought that our knowledge that e = mc 2 may be part of the absolute conception. 23 ) I have suggested that representing things from no point of view can still leave room for decisions between rival conceptualizations. What sort of thing do I have in mind? I have in mind the sort of thing that Quine has in mind when he suggests that a pair of scientific theories might be “empirically equivalent,” in the sense that “whatever observation would be counted for or against the one theory counts equally for or against the other,” yet such that each involves “theoretical terms not reducible to” the other’s. 24 He later has a splendid analogy to illustrate this. He writes: [Irresolubly rival systems of the world] describe one and the same world. Limited to our human terms and devices, we grasp the world variously. I think of the disparate ways of getting at the diameter of an impenetrable sphere: we may pinion the sphere in calipers or we may girdle it with a tape measure and divide by pi, but there is no getting inside. 25 20 For the importance of this distinction, cf. McDowell (1994), p. 28. 21 “Commonplace,” as I suggested in note 4, does not preclude opposition. For an especially stark example of opposition to just this sort of idea (that even if no one had known that p, it would still have been the case that p), see Heidegger (1962), §44(c). 22 McDowell (1994), p. 28. 23 Cf. Child (1994), pp. 61–62. 24 Quine (1990), §§41–42. The quoted material occurs on pp. 96–97. 25 Quine (1990), p. 101. (This analogy, incidentally, is curiously equivocal as far as the dualism of scheme and content is concerned. It can be construed in such a way as to provide further ammunition against the dualism. But it can also be construed in such a way as to provide support for it. Quine himself, as it happens, is not hostile to the dualism: see Quine [1981c]. For criticisms of Quine on this matter see McDowell [1994], Afterword, Pt. I.) P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 30 A. W. Moore Suppose now that we have our own system of the world but are also aware of such a rival. (This may be because our choices between conceptualizations have been quite conscious.) Quine raises the question of what we are to say about the rival. He distinguishes two attitudes that we can take. The sectarian attitude, as he calls it, is to repudiate the alien concepts and to regard the rival system as empirically warranted nonsense. (For Quine, this is not the oxymoron it sounds. “Empirically warranted nonsense” is, very roughly, nonsense which, if it did count as sense, would also have the right sort of connection with experience to count as true.) The ecumenical attitude is to acknowledge the alien concepts and to regard the rival system as simply true. 26 Tw o very powerful forces in Quine’s philosophy have made him vacillate over the years between these alternatives. His naturalism has inclined him toward sectarianism. His empiricism has inclined him toward ecumenism. By his naturalism, I mean his conviction that there is no higher authority, when it comes to deciding what is true, than whatever has in fact led us to adopt our own system of the world. By his empiricism, I mean his conviction that there is no other evidence for the truth of a system than its empirical warrant: systems answer to nothing but experience. 27 He has eventually settled for sectarianism. 28 This is surely the right alternative for Quine. After all, in the case in which we are aware of an empir- ically equivalent rival system to our own, whose concepts are not incom- mensurable with ours, he is committed to regarding the rival as, however warranted, false. 29 His sectarianism nevertheless leaves him uncomfortable. 26 Quine (1990), §42; and Quine (1986), pp. 156–157. (Note: on p. 156 of the latter he characterizes sectarianism as the view that the rival system is false rather than nonsense. But this is an aberration. It is subverted on the very next page.) Taking the ecumenical attitude would not commit us ever to exercising the alien concepts. If we chose not to, this would be a little like regarding empirically warranted French sentences as true but choosing only to speak in English. Taking the sectarian attitude would be a little like regarding English as the only real language. 27 For an example of a swing to sectarianism, see Quine (1981a), pp. 21–22. For an example of a swing to ecumenism, see the first edition of Quine (1981b), p. 29. (This is corrected in later editions. The earlier version is quoted in Gibson [1986], p. 153, n. 2.) 28 Quine (1990), p. 100; and Quine (1986), p. 157. (This explains the correction referred to in n. 27.) Cf. Rorty (1991a), §2. 29 The possibility of empirically warranted false systems is an immediate corollary of his thesis that truth is underdetermined by evidence. See Quine (1969), pp. 302–303, in which he also distinguishes between mere underdetermined truth and indeterminacy. For further discussion, see Moore (1997b). (Note: Davidson is surely wrong to claim, as he does in Davidson [2001], p. 76, n. 4, that “Quine has changed his mind on the issue [whether there can be empirically equivalent, but incompatible, theories] more than once.” The issue on which he has changed his mind is not that, but what the best construal of such theories is.) P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 Realism and the Absolute Conception 31 He recognizes the invidiousness of regarding one system as true and another as nonsense, even though there is no cosmically telling between them and even though it is nothing but a kind of historical accident that one of these systems has our allegiance rather than the other. So he is keen to remind us that we can change our allegiance. The sectarian, he tells us, is as free as the ecumenist to oscillate between the two [systems]. .Inhis sectarian way he does deem the one [system] true and the alien terms of the other meaningless, but only so long as he is entertaining the one [system] rather than the other. He can readily shift the shoe to the other foot. 30 This is not to concede, along with the ecumenist, that both systems should be regarded as true. It is not even to concede that both systems can be regarded as true. But it is to concede that each system can be regarded as true. And, as Quine himself admits, to concede this is but one terminological step away from conceding ecumenism. After all, ecumenists and sectarians alike are agreed that, whichever system has our allegiance, we must pay the rival system every compliment we can, short of giving it too our allegiance. Does anything of substance hang on whether this includes calling the rival system “true”? But then, come to that, does anything of substance hang on which system has our allegiance? It now looks melodramatic to suggest, as I did earlier, that, when we have decided between two rival conceptualizations, long- term active participation and commitment on our part may be required to sustain our decision vis-`a-vis its alternative. It even looks melodramatic to describe the two conceptualizations as “incompatible.” In what sense are they incompatible? Well, they are incompatible in the sense that the concepts involved must lead their own separate and independent lives. Or, a little more prosaically, they are incompatible in the sense that it is impossible to exercise concepts in accord with one conceptualization except at the expense of doing so in accord with the other. 31 What may require long-term active participation and commitment is, not upholding the selected conceptualization in a way that downplays the other, which is something we have no reason to do, but upholding the selected conceptualization in a way that prevents interference 30 Quine (1990), p. 100. 31 This does not rule out the possibility of combining the concepts by brute aggregation – that is, by first producing a representation in accord with one conceptualization, then conjoining a representation in accord with the other – although sectarians,ofcourse, will deny even that possibility. P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 32 A. W. Moore from the other. 32 To select, maintain, and implement a conceptualization requires keeping any rivals clearly in focus as rivals. This can take hard work. And it is this that constitutes giving allegiance to the conceptualization, or to any system that uses it. So yes; much of substance hangs on which system has our allegiance; and we had better be clear about which does. The problem now is that operating with one conceptualization rather than another, in the scientific case that we have been considering, is begin- ning to look very much like operating with one set of thick ethical concepts rather than another. Does not the indulgence that Quine says we should show to an empirically warranted rival system of the world, and that I have agreed we should show, smack very much of the indulgence that Williams says we can show to judgments involving thick ethical concepts that we do not ourselves share? 33 How then can we say that neither of the two rival scientific systems is from a point of view? Admittedly, there is one obvious and important difference between the scientific case and the ethical case, reflected in Quine’s lax sectarianism. On Quine’s view, as we have seen, we are free to shift our allegiance back and forth between the two scientific systems. Indeed he cites a possible benefit in our doing so (although, disconcertingly for my purposes, he describes the benefit as “an enriched perspective on nature” 34 ). The ethical analogue is much harder to envisage. Oscillations between social worlds may be pos- sible, either for individuals or, very differently, for groups. They may occur as a result of a kind of restlessness, or a kind of unconfidence, or even a kind of “ethical experimentation.” 35 But this sort of thing is necessarily more awkward, more disorderly, and altogether more demanding than its scientific counterpart, as well as having much less clearly defined criteria of success. I agree with Williams when he calls it a “wild exaggeration” to assimilate adopting a scientific system with living in a social world. What makes two social worlds incompatible is far more radical than what makes two scientific conceptualizations incompatible, even when each world is, in Williams’ terms, a “real option” for some group of people. 36 32 It is as if we were French purists who had nothing against English but wanted to banish Franglais. 33 Williams (1985), pp. 140 ff. (Note that Williams’ indulgence, unlike Quine’s, is ecumenical. In suitably favourable circumstances, Williams thinks, we can regard a judgment involving an alien thick ethical concept as true.) 34 Quine (1986), p. 157. (I see no reason, incidentally, to think that the possibility of shifting our allegiance in this way detracts from the importance of keeping each system at bay while trying to maintain our allegiance to the other.) 35 Williams (1985), p. 157. 36 Ibid., pp. 160 ff. See also, in greater detail, Williams (1981). P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 11:22 Realism and the Absolute Conception 33 But the problem remains. “More radical,” “harder to envisage,” “more demanding”: these all indicate differences of degree. But what is required is a difference of kind. We need some independent handle on the idea that social worlds do, and scientific conceptualizations do not, furnish different points of view. 3. WHAT THE ARGUMENT FOR THE POSSIBILITY OF THE ABSOLUTE CONCEPTION REQUIRES It seems to me that the best handle on this is given by the very argument for the possibility of the absolute conception. That is, I think we best under- stand the content of Williams’ conclusion, and of the intended contrast between science and ethics that goes with it, if we look at them in the con- text of the argument that he gives for that conclusion. 37 Understanding the argument in turn, of course, requires understanding its premise, the under- lying realism. And I have already indicated that one of my aims in this essay is to see what we can learn about the premise from the conclusion. Am I therefore involved in a vicious circle? In a circle, yes; in a vicious circle, I think not. What Williams is presenting us with, it seems to me, is a package of ideas that need to be understood together. This package is roughly as follows. All knowledge answers ultimately to a unified, substantial, autonomous reality which can, in principle, be conceived as such. To conceive it as such is to form a single conception of it such that, for any item of knowledge, the conception indicates what makes that item of knowledge true; 38 more to the point, for any two items of knowledge, the conception indicates what makes both those items of knowledge true, in such a way that it can be used in an account of how they cohere. This means that the conception cannot be from the same point of view as any given item of knowledge. For if it were, it would not be able to indicate, with the detachment necessary to be used in this way, what makes both that item of knowledge and an item of knowledge from an 37 Cf. Moore (1997a), pp. 82–83. 38 By “indicates” here, I do not mean “makes reference to”; I mean something more like “expresses.” Thus consider someone who knows that the earth orbits the sun. In order to indicate the fact that makes this item of knowledge true, the conception must actually incorporate the claim that the earth orbits the sun – or else a set of claims that entail that the earth orbits the sun. It cannot just incorporate some claim about the fact that makes this item of knowledge true, for instance the claim that the item of knowledge is made true by the fact which Copernicus famously established. For (part of) the significance of this distinction, see further later, esp. n. 56. [...]... consequence of the sort mentioned earlier, to the psychological and sociological elements in it that explain our actual sensitivity to how things are.47 However that may be, I repeat that the best handle on Williams’ notion of the absolute conception is given by the very argument for its possibility What the absolute conception is is that which the argument for the possibility of the absolute conception. .. deny it would be, not to repudiate the concepts in whose terms it is couched, but rather (on the contrary) to appropriate those concepts and to repudiate the realism itself – to count the realism as false And that is not something that anyone who fully understands the realism can do To appropriate those concepts is, among other things, to acknowledge the truth of the realism If someone appears to deny... of the material in this paragraph See, e.g., Williams, (1985), p 150 Ibid., pp 142 and 147 11:22 P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas Realism and the Absolute Conception 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 41 within his realism between, on the one hand, directly expressing what members of the community know – that is, what they know through exercise of their thick ethical concepts – and, on the other... in the quotation.60 By contrast, he may be able to do the latter He may be able to understand enough about the community, about their social world, and about its history to be able to see how their use of these concepts enables them to live in that world, and he may be able to say, in the light of that, how their circumstances warrant the exercise of the knowledgeable judgments they make using these... namely, the way in which Williams’ realism, by sustaining the argument for the possibility of the absolute conception, creates an ideal framework for expressing his opposition to realism about ethics It is important here to be clear just what the relation between his realism tout court and his opposition to realism about ethics is The latter does not of course follow from the former (in the way that the. .. our grasp of the absolute conception involves our being sensitive to the fact that things are a certain way, it must include that part of the explanation which says that things are indeed that way – which it will trivially do As far as the rest of the explanation is concerned, the most that we can demand of the absolute conception – although we can indeed demand this – is that it should stand in some... again n 42 The kind of dilation or manipulation that I have in mind is illustrated in the case in which A knows that it is humid and B, in the very same place six months later, knows that it is snowing: in order to indicate what A and B between them know (which is 11:22 P1: SBT 9780521662161c01K CUNY946/Thomas Realism and the Absolute Conception 978 0 521 66216 1 July 11, 2007 39 basic idea, then, is... [it].”45 The reason for this more circumspect demand is precisely the fact that a good reflective explanation of how we have come by any given knowledge must be from some sort of psychosocial point of view Williams is well aware of this, despite the impression that his critics sometimes give.46 There is of course the further question, which part of the explanation the absolute conception must include The. .. view cohere, it is necessary to go beyond the resources of the absolute conception The absolute conception can supply part of this account, certainly In particular, it can indicate what makes the items of knowledge both true; that is of its very essence But it cannot indicate, on its own, how either of them is made true (how, for instance, the point of view of either contributes to its having whatever... from the way we normally think and speak.61 Still, the way we normally think and speak is not sacrosanct This advantage can be outweighed.62 Let us turn back to the question whether tense is real Here the Goodmanian alternative might be thought to have an 60 61 62 See further ibid., pp 141–142, and the references therein See also McDowell (1981), pp 144–145 Cf the parenthetical remark in n 48 Cf in . 2007 11:22 Realism and the Absolute Conception 27 conception, ” or the absolute conception of reality,” where what this is is, precisely, a conception. POSSIBILITY OF THE ABSOLUTE CONCEPTION REQUIRES It seems to me that the best handle on this is given by the very argument for the possibility of the absolute conception.